Property Guides

Barcelona is officially the city for Vegetarians

A new initiative has introduced Meat-free Mondays and more vegetarianism as a whole into the city of Barcelona, with the support of the local council. The Spanish are meat lovers; there is no doubt about it. If you are vegetarian or vegan, you are traditionally likely to find problems when looking for food you can eat – unless of course, you specifically seek out one of the few vegetarian restaurants available, usually only in the larger towns and cities.

How much would you pay to dine in at home in Spain?

One of the pleasures that living in Spain offers is the chance to eat out regularly at reasonable prices. Whether you go out with friends for tapas or for a menú del día for lunch, you’ll always find good food that doesn’t cost the earth. If you feel like staying in one evening and cooking yourselves a good meal, though, how much will you have to spend?

A Blood Sport or an Art form?

Love it or hate it, bullfighting is deeply imbedded in Spanish culture – although perhaps for not much longer, as the animal rights groups are slowly but surely upsetting this once all pervading so called “sport”.

A morning spent inside the Catalan Institute of Public Safety

There is a strong police presence in Spain. We often see various police forces stationed at roundabouts monitoring and stopping drivers, police patrolling the streets and beaches, police at public events large and small and patrol cars making nightly rounds. Catalonia has its own police force, the Mossos d’Esquadra which protects the 7 million people who live in the region and its own Police Academy, the ISPC (Institut de Seguretat Pública de Catalunya) located near Barcelona.

Lawnmowers and lemons: our Easter in the Costa Brava

Gin and tonic tastes a million times better with home-grown lemons. Trust me, I’ve tried it, so have the neighbours! So, finding my four-foot lemon tree dripping with fruit when I arrived at my Costa Brava villa this week was a real treat, at least for me and the wife, who enjoy a sundowner. The children – three year old Clemence, six year old Harry and nine year old Maddy – were more excited about slurping away on their all-time favourite drink, chocolate flavoured Cacaolat, which you don’t get in the UK. I think the youngest can see off a carton in under 10 seconds now.

Tasting food straight from the sea on the Costa Brava

Catalonia has a culture of its own and at this time of the year it celebrates a small creature which lives in the sea – the sea urchin. For the last 20 years, the town of Palafrugell has organised an important gastronomic event called La Garoinada. Sea urchins have many different names throughout Catalonia, but Palafrugell is the only place that calls sea urchins “garoines.”

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